I haven't started my bike for most of the winter. I know, shame on me. I put a trickle charger on the battery the other day so that it could charge up. now it will turn over, but it won't fire. It doesn't even try to start. Any one have any ideas?

 

try flicking the kill switch on/off/on a few times,3/4 choke and absolutely no throttle at all.,stick prime on and spin it,providing the battery is full itll go eventually.
dont touch that throttle tho.....and do it upright not leaning over on side stand.

 

Did you use staybil or anything like it? Perhaps your gas has gone by the wayside.

 

Easy, either its not getting gas or its not getting spark.

Spark is easy to check, pull out plug (or get a spare) and attach it to the boot, then ground the threads on the head. It should be a bright spark the flickers evenly (like this X,X,X,X,X,X,X not X, , X, ,X,X, ,X with the X's being the sparks).

Gas is easy to I suppose, grab a can of the super flammable brake cleaner or starter fluid, spray it up into the air box towards your carbs with the air filter removed. If she fires right up then you know its your fueling.

If you got spark and you sprayed too, still no fire. Hmmm, better check for air leaks and engine compression.

 

In the same situation myself last weekend. Bike laid up over winter, battery on trickle charger but try as i might bike would just not fire. So got the jump leads out and connect bike up to the car battery (car not running) and she fired up instantly and has been running great since. Sometimes they just need that extra bit of umph to get going.

 

I'll give your idea's a shot and let you know what happens.

 

Mine did the same thing. I had to replace my battery.
It wouldn't start with a charger. Had to hook jumper cables up to my truck and start the truck. finally the bike would fire. It was wierd... Even with the charger the bike would turn over fast and all. Just wouldn't start. But after I charged the old bettery I still had to jump it. And my lights dimmed when I was at idle.
Went and bought me a new battery trickle charged it overnite... Start everytime with out trouble. Hell... It even makes it run better! But it stay charged. Wether I leave it in the garage for day or a week.

 

yep,agree,,my triumph is very finicky and its all down to the charge in the(now new)battery.
its like theres a volt reader in there somewhere that wont let it go until its reached an acceptable level even tho it would spin ok.,very strange stuff..

 

Well, it's running. I made sure that I was getting spark, and made sure that I saw gas going into the fuel filter when I was trying to start it. I took out the aid cleaner, shot some starting fluid at the carbs and it fired right up. It idled kinda rough for a few minutes, but then smoothed out. Took it for a spin and it's running great. I'm hoping to get a tune up soon. What do you guys normally do for a tune up? I would like to get my valves adjusted, but can't do both. Thanks for the help.

 

Cool, maybe it just needed a prime to get her running. Weird, but whatever, it worked